In recent years there has been a tremendous increase in the use of so called "mini storage" facilities. The homeowner, having filled his garage to the point of making it unuseable for anything but storage, has been storing some of his seldom used possessions in small or mini, remote storage facilities. While this does relieve the problem which he has in connection with storing items, the process of loading the items into a transporting truck or trailer and then unloading them and reloading them into a secure remote storage facility is tedious and time consuming.
In the transportation industry large storage containers are widely used for the movement of goods and equipment from site to site. Such large containers provide an economical method for moving small items, and also can be used as a relatively secure structure for temporarily storing the goods which they contain. Typically in the transportation industry loading and unloading of containers is accomplished by forklift trucks or cranes. In the shipping industry, for example, a crane will be used to move the container from the deck of a cargo ship to the bed of a truck. While effective, this approach to the handling of goods requires very expensive equipment which is not readily available to the homeowner.
Another approach which has been used in the trucking industry has been detachable container-chassis systems in which the cargo box of a tractor and trailer assembly can be removed from the frame or chassis on which it is mounted to permit loading, unloading or storage of items in the container while the tractor and chassis are used for other jobs. Typical of such systems are the apparatus set forth in the U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,817,413, 3,520,433, 3,460,697, 3,425,576, 3,180,511 and 3,112,836.
Usually these detachable containers or cargo box systems include a plurality of legs which are carried by the container and can be used to lift the container up off of the truck chassis. The chassis is then driven away from the container and the container is either left standing on the legs or can be lowered by telescoping the legs to close proximity with the ground.
Such detachable containers-chassis systems, however, have been constructed in a manner which requires each of the containers to have some form of loading and unloading structure which may be used alone, or in combination with the structure carried by the truck and trailer. Moreover, the use of either fixed or telescoping legs has certain disadvantages. There can be problems with stability, particularly if the container is left unloaded and on support legs which elevate it a substantial distance off the ground. Most of the prior art telescoping leg systems are independently operable and therefore require several people to lower all of the legs simultaneously or else result in tilting of the container body as the user works around the container and lowers each leg a small increment.
Finally, the detachable container system has been widely employed in connection with refuse, namely, the demountable dumpster system. A large, usually open-top container is unloaded from a truck bed by tilting the bed and allowing the container to slide off onto the ground, at which point the truck is driven out from under the container. In loading the container back onto the truck, a cable is used to pull the container up on the tilted truck bed, and then the bed is pivoted to the horizontal position. While highly effective in dealing with refuse, this tilting container or dumpster approach is not suited for use with items which require care in handling.